NAPLES, Fla. - Jamey Mosch was found alive Friday, November 20th, after being lost in the everglades for four days...

Jayme went hunting on his own Monday the 16Th of November. An avid outdoorsman, had had a compass but it was broken. He became disoriented and had to spend the night out in the thick brush...

"I stepped over a log, I ended up going into quicksand, which, I didn't even think there was quicksand here," said Mosch.

"I had to undo everything to get out and boom, that's when I had to loose my boots my pants," said Mosch. "When you lose everything in the quicksand the first day, all of a sudden you go from having everything to not having one thing, ...to nothing. Not boots, nothing."

Dam sure. My one buddy had a good compas and still got lost. learned why they named the place he was hunting Iron mountain Mi. had to wait for dawn to find his way!!!Got back to camp as the guys where going out to look for him.

also one of the most important thing is to tell someone where you are going and when you will be back, a cell phone is also a great tool to bring if there is service in the area,in case of an emergency the gps feature can help save your life.

Sometimes it doesn't matter what you have you can still get lost. It's important to learn the field craft that is vital to your area in case you do.
For starters GPS's are nice but they have their weaknesses. They run out of batteries and they are dependent on a good signal to get an accurate reading. Some people have a tendency to get hypnotized staring at the screen and pay no attention to where their feet are walking, especially at night. The GPS will not tell you about mine shafts, barbed wire fences, or cliffs that can get you in worse trouble than you were to start with.
While analog compasses are good, people usually don't buy the quality necessary for finding your way out of the wilderness. A person who is serious about orienteering to save their life should not purchase the Walmart bargain compass. I, personally would recommend two compasses, one sighting compass, like a Suunto KB-14 with quadrants and an adjustable declination, and a compass specifically made for topo maps, like Silva, this one doesn't have to be expensive. A person following a bearing can get screwed by declination, as most people do not know that the true polar north can move as much as 4 degrees which isn't much if you're only going a few hundred yards, but if your going a few miles or even further, you can be off target by a long distance, leaving you lost in the opposite direction.
Even if you are using a GPS a topographic map is ideal. There are very few people nowadays that can actually read one, and it is a good skill to have. A skilled user can pull coordinates off a topo and enter it into a GPS and go to that spot without ever having to have stepped in that part of the country ever before.
Another handy tool to use in conjunction with a topo map is a protractor. I like to drill a hole in the center and put a piece of thin string in the hole to pull off a bearing lightning fast if you are using a compass.

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